Kinect developer preview for Windows 10

With Kind permission from the Product Group, I am reprinting this from an email that went out the Kinect developers mailing list.

Please also check out Mike Taulty’s blog for a walkthrough of what’s provided. The short version, though, is now you can access the perception API’s to work with Kinect v2 in a UWP app as well as use your Kinect v2 for face recognition as a replacement for your password. Please bear in mind that this is the public preview rather than a final release.

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We are happy to announce our public preview of Kinect support for Windows 10.

Getting started is easy. First, make sure you already have a working Kinect for Windows V2 attached to your Windows 10 PC. The Kinect Configuration Verifier can make sure everything is functioning okay. Also, make sure your Kinect has a good view of your face – we recommend centering it as close to the top or bottom of your monitor as possible, and at least 0.5 meters from your face.

Then follow these steps to install the Kinect developer preview for Windows 10:

1. The first step is to opt-in to driver flighting. You can follow the instructions here to set up your registry by hand, or you can use the following text to create a .reg file to right-click and import the settings:

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\DriverFlighting\Partner]

“TargetRing”=”Drivers”

2. Next, you can use Device Manager to update to the preview version of the Kinect driver and runtime:

1. Open Device Manager (Windows key + x, then m).

2. Expand “Kinect sensor devices”.

3. Right-click on “WDF KinectSensor Interface 0”.

4. Click “Update Driver Software…”

5. Click “Search automatically for updated driver software”.

6. Allow it to download and install the new driver.

7. Reboot.

Once you have the preview version of the Kinect for Windows V2 driver (version 2.1.1511.11000 or higher), you can start developing sensor apps for Windows 10 using Visual Studio 2015 with Windows developer tools. You can also set up Windows Hello to log in using your Kinect.